Currently, many photographic processing compositions are sold as concentrated solutions which are diluted at usage. However, the concentrated solutions are heavy and bulky, and an improvement in transport cost, storage space and operative efficiency has been strongly demanded. In order to solve this problem, a solid processing composition has been proposed. The solid processing composition is preferable in view of reduction of containers and an environmental improvement
However, the solid processing composition has a problem in that it takes a long time to dissolve. That is, when the solid processing composition and water are replenished to a processing tank, the solid component is slow in dissolving and remains insoluble, resulting in deterioration of processing properties. Particularly, rapid processing is recently predominant, and development time is 30 seconds or less or a large amount of light sensitive materials such as 100m.sup.2 /hour are processed. Such a rapid and continuous processing caused marked dissolving retardation, resulting in deterioration of processing properties.
The deterioration of processing properties due to the above dissolving retardation includes sensitivity deviation in development or deterioration of fixibility or drying in fixing. In order to solve this problem, a method has been proposed in which the form of the solid composition is improved or a solid composition crushing means is provided on an automatic processor, but the method is not sufficient to solve the problem.